I can't believe how much my Angel has grown since this picture was taken. I was pregnant with Jacob in this picture, so she couldn't have been more than 2 yrs old, if that. Looking at this picture, the one thought that pops in my mind is her hair. My poor baby had a hard time growing hair at first. She longed to have long hair like all the other girls her age. She would go and get my scarfs and have me tie them around her head and she would pretend that was her hair.=( I can remember her asking me day after day; night after night...."Mommy will I have long hair like Emmy (Emily was a neighbor girl, a year older than Grace, who had hair to her fanny)?" It broke my heart seeing her long for long hair. My mother and I bought her wigs one time. She loved them! She really felt special with those wigs. Of coarse, the day came that her hair, literally grew, what seemed like over night. Her hair is so long and curly now. She is a BEAUTIFUL LITTLE GIRL. This unfortunately, will not be the last time I see her long for something that she may not get at the time she wants it. It will not be the last time I see her heart broken. Mother's and Daughter's share a special bond. They may not always get along in life; we daughters tend think we know more than our mothers, shame on us for ever thinking that. However, both could learn a great deal from each other.
When I was a child, my mother and I had a sweet, wonderful relationship. I always wanted to please my mom. I always wanted to spend time with her.Then the day came I became a teenager..Then something happen. I began to grow up; trying to find my place is this world. I was wanting to be independent. In the process, wanted no help from my mother because I thought I knew it all. I thought she was trying to smother me, trying to do everything for me; wanting to fix it all. Now, that I am a Mom, I see she was only trying to protect me from the pain and rejection of this world.
This was the woman I would come home and cry to when I didn't get asked to dance at the school dances. I would cry to her because all my friends had boyfriends and I didn't. I would ask her what was wrong with me.? She would always tell me nothing; that I was beautiful, that maybe they were to shy to ask me to dance and to shy to ask me to be their "girl."
Then I turned 16 yrs. old and turn my back on her. I thought she was trying to rule my life and control me. Again, she was only protecting me and wanting a close relationship with me. She knew something I didn't. She knew that I would soon be graduating and would be out on my own. I never saw that during that time. If I would not had been so stubborn; then maybe she would've not tried so hard to be my best friend. Instead would have concentrated more on being my mother. She wanted nothing more than for her and I to be best friends. To share more precious moments before I was truly grown and gone. I cheated her!....If I would've tried harder to have a mother, daughter relationship with her; then she would've been the mom I always wanted her to be back then. I didn't want her to be my best friend; I wanted her to be my mom. She was just trying so hard to reach out, she just wanted me to love her like I did before. I broke her heart! A lot of mistakes were made on both parts. We, over time have forgiven each other. Unfortunately, the memories of those hard times remain. I can never go back and make right what went wrong back then with her and I. Neither can she. I'm just glad we have moved past that time of our lives together.
Now, I am grown and married, with three kids of my own. One being a little girl. I hope one day, Grace and I can be best friends. But, for now and until she is grown and own her own, I will be her Mother. I will have to be the bad guy from time to time. I will have to protect her at times when she thinks she knows what is best for her. It will not be fun and it will be hard at times. But with God's help he will see us through. I will have to remind myself, "Mom first; friend last."
Daughters want a relationship with their moms, but not one like they have with their girlfriends. They want one above that, better than that, one with rules and boundaries. We will test the rules and boundaries from time to time. That is when moms step in and bring us back to reality. We daughters and mothers just long for a Mother and Daughter relationship. Which is more special; more precious than any friendship we could ever have.
